Seth Lynch

All posts tagged Seth Lynch

Arty Homebrook lived and died in a world of sleaze which stretched from Chicago to Paris but never beyond the gutter. He’d been sleeping with Madame Fulton, which is why Harry Fulton promised to kill him. So far as the Paris Police are concerned it’s an open and shut case. Harry’s father has other ideas and hires Salazar to investigate.

A Dead American in Paris places Salazar in the midst of an unpleasant underworld of infidelity, blackmail, backstreet abortions and murder. It’s enough to make you want to chuck it all in and take a job cleaning out the sewers. But Salazar is far too inquisitive to walk away and far too stubborn to know what’s for the best. So he wakes up each hungover morning, blinks into the sunlight, and presses on until it’s his life on the line. Then he presses on some more, just for the hell of it.

What did I think?:

First of all, thank you so much to Emma Welton, amazing blogger extraordinaire at damppebbles, all round good egg and now blog tour organiser who invited me to take part in this blog tour via email. Thank you also to Fahrenheit Press who provided me with a copy of A Dead American In Paris in exchange for an honest review. I have a great love for crime fiction although I sadly, I don’t read it half as much as I used to as I felt that what I was reading was getting a bit “samey.” I tend to reserve reading the genre for books my fellow bloggers have got me really excited about, something out of the box and a bit different where I’m not going to predict the outcome halfway through. That’s why I’m so pleased that I read this book. Although it’s the second in the series and I haven’t read the first, A Citizen Of Nowhere, I genuinely believe that it can be read and enjoyed as a stand-alone. A Dead American In Paris is different in that it reads like a classic book in the genre. This is not only because of the time period it is set in, the early thirties in Paris but the writing style feels vintage, almost as if the author had placed himself directly within the 1930’s and is writing about it as he sees it at that moment – if that makes any sense?

Seth Lynch, author of A Dead American In Paris, the second book in The Salazar Mysteries.

Our male lead for the narrative is private detective, Salazar who has become embroiled in a very interesting case that looks remarkably like a murder carried out in a fit of jealous rage. The victim is Arty Homebrook, a rather shady character who sleeps around with a number of married women and appears to live quite a meagre existence in a shady, dirty flat. One of the aggrieved husbands, Harry Fulton is the main suspect in this case and is currently in jail pending trial. However, Fulton’s father has recently employed Salazar to find out the truth about what happened that night and of course, the real story behind the murder, is much murkier and more convoluted than anyone directly or indirectly involved in the case could ever have suspected.

An image of 1930’s Paris, where our story is set.

A Dead American In Paris was such a pleasant surprise. As I read the synopsis, I instantly knew that I was interested but I still wasn’t prepared for the journey that Seth Lynch would take me on. Not only were the characters wonderfully drawn but they felt incredibly authentic and after a very short time of reading, I wanted to know everything and anything about them. We have a wonderful and intriguing male lead in Salazar who is sarcastic, determined, impulsive but also tormented by his experiences during the First World War and by other, more individual worries and mental issues which plague him from time to time. In my eyes, this made him both a delight to read (in the way of his snide comments and that you never knew what he was going to try next!) and that he was undeniably human, with all the anxieties we all suffer at certain points in our lives.

I completely fell in love with this story. The plot, the characters, the way it moved steadily and slowly, each reveal happening methodically and intelligently. However, my favourite part had to be how it ended. As I alluded to in the first paragraph of my review, I hate the predictable and it’s a relief to know that Seth Lynch isn’t just going to rest easy on his laurels with a cliche….that’s all I’m saying!

Would I recommend it?:

But of course!

Star rating (out of 5):

AUTHOR INFORMATION

Born and brought up in the West of England, Seth has also lived in Carcassonne, Zurich and the Isle of Man.

With two daughters, his writing time is the period spent in cafés as the girls do gym, dance and drama lessons.

Thank you once again to Emma Welton and Fahrenheit Pressfor inviting me to take part in this blog tour, I’ve had a wonderful time doing it. A Dead American In Paris was published in August 2017 and will be available as a e-book. If you fancy some more information don’t forget to check out the rest of the stops on this blog tour for some amazing reviews!